Quote Originally Posted by quivira kid View Post
I feel your pain! Tying small stuff with partridge or quail does it to me too. The stem of the feather gets a bit too brittle and breaks right before you're grabbing the bobbin to tie it off... Yup! Been there many times. Cuss it and keep going! Those will catch crappie and bluegills for sure.
Part of the problem is quality of feathers we get now. Bought an Oz. of that Chinese Saddle hackle and it's giving me fits.

Lots of tiers that are not fly tiers don't realize what all goes into feathers and how you can buy some high end skins that the hackle stems are oval and not round so they tie easier. Of course that is mostly for dry flies and like I said the high end of raising chickens to get great quality in tying feathers.

These are cheap!

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